Contents

Introduction

The K-epsilon model is one of the most common turbulence models, although it just doesn't perform well in cases of large adverse pressure gradients (Reference 4). It is a two equation model, that means, it includes two extra transport equations to represent the turbulent properties of the flow. This allows a two equation model to account for history effects like convection and diffusion of turbulent energy.

The first transported variable is turbulent kinetic energy, . The second transported variable in this case is the turbulent dissipation, . It is the variable that determines the scale of the turbulence, whereas the first variable, , determines the energy in the turbulence.

There are two major formulations of K-epsilon models (see References 2 and 3). That of Launder and Sharma is typically called the "Standard" K-epsilon Model. The original impetus for the K-epsilon model was to improve the mixing-length model, as well as to find an alternative to algebraically prescribing turbulent length scales in moderate to high complexity flows.

As described in Reference 1, the K-epsilon model has been shown to be useful for free-shear layer flows with relatively small pressure gradients. Similarly, for wall-bounded and internal flows, the model gives good results only in cases where mean pressure gradients are small; accuracy has been shown experimentally to be reduced for flows containing large adverse pressure gradients. One might infer then, that the K-epsilon model would be an inappropriate choice for problems such as inlets and compressors.